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Several readers have sent word that George Hotz (a.k.a. geohot), the hacker best known for unlockingApple's iPhone, says he has now hacked the PlayStation 3. From his blog post:
"I have read/write access to the entire system memory, and HV level access to the processor. In other words, I have hacked the PS3. The rest is just software. And reversing. I have a lot of reversing ahead of me, as I now have dumps of LV0 and LV1. I've also dumped the NAND without removing it or a modchip. 3 years, 2 months, 11 days...that's a pretty secure system. ... As far as the exploit goes, I'm not revealing it yet. The theory isn't really patchable, but they can make implementations much harder. Also, for obvious reasons I can't post dumps. I'm hoping to find the decryption keys and post them, but they may be embedded in hardware. Hopefully keys are setup like the iPhone's KBAG."

I guess the main reason for this will be so you can play pirated games. Homebrew is already possible on PS3 and lets not kid ourselves, piracy is always what these things are mostly used for.

But even more worrysome is if this enables complete access to system and memory, cheating will become a problem. For example 360 hack isn't the same, you can't run your own code or modify memory on it - it merely allows you to play pirat^H^H^H^H^H backups. This will be a lot more serious hack.

I usually play on PC, but when I'm playing on PS3/360 I like that I know there aren't cheaters. While packet-modifying is theorically possible if there isn't any encryption or checksums in the network data, cheating on consoles is a lot smaller problem than on PC and some types of cheats (wallhacks etc) are impossible to create without direct access to memory and code.

A lot of lessons have been learned from the original Xbox days. By the end, essentially you couldn't get online without the original dash and a retail game, which limited hacks to whatever you could do with game saves or screwing with the downloaded content. Those are relatively easy to police. I imagine Sony will be keen to do something similar, and set up their servers to dropkick anyone who logs in with an unapproved configuration.

If you choose to trust your client, then you are planning for failure, because any successful client application is going to get hacked.

I guess it's a simple economic calculation: by the time your client has a large enough userbase that someone takes the time to hack it, you've already made your profit. Screw anyone who buys it after the client is owned - they should have got in at launch.

Oh, sure, that's probably true. But if it's made difficult enough, and the vendor is vigilant for hacking, it can be made almost impossible. Take the 360, where just a couple months ago a ton of hacked consoles were banned from Xbox Live forever. Most people just don't bother with hacking because they know that one day Microsoft might bring the hammer down on them for online play. And it works. I have several friends who pirate practically all the media they consume, but they have vanilla unmodded Xboxes and buy their games. Why? Because Microsoft's anti-piracy and anti-cheat has been overall successful, and really the only way you can cheat on Live is with a lag switch, and even that is harder now since most games let people boot obvious cheaters.
What has been said in jest many many times here, I say with a straight face. I, for one, welcome our new online game overlords. I don't play online PC games anymore because of all the cheating issues. There are sooo many less cheaters on Xbox it's a whole different world.

Mod parent up! I was going to say the same thing. I hadn't heard of a workaround and upon reading the links realized it was the same as I'd read before: you're cloning a non-banned box so that *it* gets the chance to be banned soon.

Why on earth has the parent been modded up? It's one of the most blatantly misinformed rants I've read in a long time.

Before I go any further, let me make one thing clear; for certain genres of games (fpses and RTSes, in particular), I very much like having a dedicated server option. I'm absolutely not arguing against this; I was annoyed by the Modern Warfare 2 fiasco as well.

However the simple fact is that cheating is less prevalent in games which use a centralised server system, or a closed matchmaking system than in games which have a more distributed public model. At the extreme end of the scale, you have MMOs, where the server infrastructure is more or less provided exclusively by the publisher. The server is therefore pretty much locked down. Yes, you occasionally get cheats detected from the client-side (Final Fantasy XI had a bad rash of these for a while), but they tend to get addressed very quickly and the consequences for getting caught cheating are severe (usually the deletion of your account, with the loss of all progress).

At the other extreme you have Counter-Strike, back as it used to be in the wild before Valve finally developed half-way useful anticheat. If you joined a public game, you could almost take it for granted that at least one person on the server would be cheating. I used to be the head-admin of a league, with a few hundred players, and every season, a couple of those players would be caught cheating. It used to be pretty steady... in the 1-2% range. And by and large, the consequences were pretty low. Until fairly late in the day, the worst that would happen if you cheated on a public server would be that the admin would notice and ban you. If you were stupid enough to do it in a league, your team would get kicked out. Moreover, while bans could theoretically be enforced using a unique ID linked to your Half-Life CD key, the system was so badly broken that it was trivial for even your average idiot to get around it. Over time, Valve tightened up on this - and how did they do it? By more centralised anti-cheat, centralised player-registries and so on.

Allowing cheating in multiplayer games is a very, very bad thing for a developer or publisher to be seen to do. It annoys honest players (who are, anecdotally, more liable to have bought the game legitimately rather than be using a pirated version) and makes them less likely to buy your products in future.

Single-player cheat codes are an entirely different kettle of fish. Nobody really cares if you cheat in a single-player game. It doesn't detract from anybody else's experience. So if companies want to include singleplayer cheat codes, then let them. To be honest, the whole "achievements" thing, and the "socialisation" (I know that's an ugly term, but I can't think of a better one) of single-player gaming on the 360 and PS3 has meant that single-player cheat codes have actually become far rarer than they used to be.

There's an entirely separate discussion over whether "premium" content in multiplayer focussed games is starting to intrude on gameplay mechanics, as opposed to being purely cosmetic, but this probably isn't the time or the place for that.

Because while these servers exist, they aren't very popular. The user-base of the average 3rd-party server is, as I understand it, less than 100. Most WoW players are aware of them... and make the decision to steer well clear and stick with the better resourced, better administered official servers. If anything, I'd take the "open" WoW servers as an example that the third-party server model just doesn't work for MMOs.

There may be a market for middlingly-multiplayer (say... up to 40 people) persistent world games with third party servers (like the old MUDs, but updated for the modern age). But I'm talking here about the kind of thing that Neverwinter Nights has made a nod towards in the past with some of its more ambitious modules, not something on the scale of WoW.

I mean -- it's brilliant -- vendors restricting our use of our property for our own good, the good of the collective users, or maybe just the good of their bank accounts.

They should do this on cars too. Vehicle manufactures should come equipped with GPS based governors, alcohol detection, sex detection, and reckless driving detection straight from factory. This could even be extended to manual shoulder checks , cellphones, smoking, eating, talking, and ev

Just for the record, are we talking:a) I'm detecting you're receiving a blowjob while driving, so I'm just going to pull over for a bitb) I'm detecting you're a woman, so I'm limiting top speed to 50(kph, not mph) or simply not starting at all

To reduce accidents, it would probably be more effective to reduce engine performance to a minimum whenever a male driver under the age of 30 is detected.

The best accident reduction approach would be to temporarily incapacitate anyone who touches a smart phone while driving. And then give them a taser-like shock, knock them out and tattoo "douchebag" on their forehead.

I wish I could stamp "douchebag" on the forehead of everyone who brings up smartphones as though they're some kind of new evil. I've driven behind plenty of people reading books, doing makeup, curling their hair and even eating soup (with two hands).

The problem isn't phones, the problem is people driving stupidly. Stop it with the moronic rants about cell phones already.

Jesus Christ, he's not coming out in support of locked-down hardware, he's just pointing out that in principle (as has happened on previous occasions) breaking a console can lead to a wave of shitheads ruining your gaming experience. That's a trade-off that's worth debating.

Sony is perfectly fine with you running software sold for the PS3; that's how they make their money. Hacking it so that you can give that software away isn't in their best interest, so they build in DRM. The Windows comparison doesn't hold water in this case.

It keeps their developers happy and maintains a semblance of sanity on their system. It's ugly, but seeing that its main purpose is to be a gaming system, it does the job. They don't stop you from remotely streaming or locally playing any kind of media; you're free to knock yourself out. Heck, they even support DivX.

Given a choice, Sony would rather restrict their infinitesimally small Linux base because, quite frankly, nobody really cares. People who are bloody-minded enough to use them as a processing farm are more curiosities than mainstream, and I'm sure that serious efforts, such as by universities and the like, get one-on-one support from Sony if they want it.

Linux users on the PS3: zero profit. PS3 gamers on the PS3: the whole reason the system was made. I think that the line of reasoning is pretty straightforward here.

I had an idea for WiiWare that I was interested in putting together, but was turned off by Nintendo's policy which specifically calls for a 'secured office environment capable of protecting our intellectual property', and additionally says that home offices are unacceptable.
So I noted with great interest an interview with 2DBoy when they related that they floated from coffee shop to coffee shop during the development of World of Goo [gamasutra.com]:

Are you guys officially the entirety of 2D Boy?

KG: Yeah, we're just two people for the bulk of this project. We don't have an office, but we're not allowed to say that, so we just work out of coffee shops and stuff.

I'd be interested to know how wide (and how common) the gap is between Ni

There is a point to limiting certain products so they function as a level playing field. PC gaming is frustrating because of wallhackers and morons with aimbots. Console gaming is preferable because it's generally difficult to hack the system. Limiting products increases the value it has.

PC gaming is frustrating because of wallhackers and morons with aimbots. Console gaming is preferable because it's generally difficult to hack the system.

The problem with console gaming comes when almost no games are designed to be legitimately modded by players. Without legit modding, there would be no Counter-Strike. Sony consoles have RPG Maker 2 on PS2, LittleBigPlanet on PS3, and then what else?

You can't access some of the hardware, particularly the GFX from an "Other OS" and the new slim models don't even support the Other OS option, so no, this is not just for cheating and piracy and there is no current way to run homebrew well.

We can even run linux better in a hacked system as currently the graphics performance is pretty dreadful. There is far more to life than piracy and cheating. I welcome this development.

Helll, I'd welcome it even if there were few to no forseeable applications, just the opening up of a new computer platform...

Hell a box like that with Linux and Cedega you would have a pretty cheap kick ass HTPC that could run a few PC games as well. Video transcoding, ripping, HDMI, ability to play almost any format of audio/video, really good processing power for the price, maybe I should get a job selling these babies. At the end of the day Sony is pissed because of their narrow minded approach that their game sales will tank but if enough of these things are hooked up to enough TV sets they will have a new opportunity maybe even roll their own OS that people actually want to use. Sony can put a pretty penny into R&D for a new OS / UI that could be pretty enough and they can sell you bits and bytes all day long. This is really what evolution/revolution is all about, sometimes they drag us kicking and screaming sometimes we do the same to them.

Sorry, but Wine and its derivatives can only ever work on x86 hardware (or hardware with x86 compatibility) as I understand it. You can move binaries between OS's by emulating.intercepting.translating system calls, but not between architectures.

It would need native linux games to be compiled for PPC, preferably designed and built specially for Cell hardware.

No, you can't. You can move it between OSes by wrapping system calls, no emulation is involved. Different OSes on the same architecture have access to more or less the same set of instructions, differences between specific chips not withstanding.

Emulation only comes into play when you need instructions that are not available at all on a given architecture or that for one reason or another differ.

Most games are already abstracted through DirectX anyway so they don't directly rely on the hardware to begin with (hence why you can run the same game on ATI/Nvidia). Since they have already figured out most of the calls (enough to make many games work) adapting to a new architecture isn't really all that bad. Especially if Cedega runs on the kernel and stock libraries it will make the transition all that much easier.

Wine is actually working on getting support for other architectures (ARM is the one I noteced), presumably either to add support for WinMo apps on Android or similar (WinCE API is a bit different from Win32, but not extremely) or to support compiling a Win32 app for Linux on ARM.

That said, the gist of your post is completely correct. For now, at least, Wine would be completely useless on the Cell or any other PPC-based processor.

I guess the main reason for this will be so you can play pirated games. Homebrew is already possible on PS3 and lets not kid ourselves, piracy is always what these things are mostly used for.

You're forgetting one thing - homebrew is possible, but access to the 3d hardware is disabled so that unofficial software can't compete with official games. That, combined with the removal of the ability to even use a 3rd party operating system in the new hardware revisions, is a rather compelling reason to hack the PS3.

You can easily cheat anyway. Just use a gateway between your PS3 and the internet. Then you can alter the packet data to your heart's content. See an enemy? Have the program on the gateway auto-aim for you by changing your target coordinates. If you're counting on the platform to stop cheaters you'll be very disappointed. I'd be quite shocked if such programs don't already get used, I know they existed for past platforms.

.. which I did mention in my post, but seriously that is a lot smaller problem and available for lesser users than on PC, where you just download a hack from internet and run it. However, only having access to packet data does remove some kind of cheats, like wallhacks for example.

Also theres a significant technical challenge to do live packet-modifying between PS3 and Internet. If someone is doing it, they probably are also capable of being subtle enough with their hacking. The major assholes running aroun

No it's not. In this case there is a very valid reason to hack the PS3. Linux with full access to the hardware! So far you couldn't use the GPU and you where only using a small part of the CPU processing power. Now imagine having this great multiprocessor architecture completely unlocked for you to program it. These are great news.

Actually there is no longer any way to run homebrew on PS3, unless you manage to run it as BD-Live content from a disc somehow (like BluTV).

With PS3 Slim the ability to run "Other OS" disappeared with Sony citing costs to maintain the feature as the reason to kill it off.

The homebrew option was never really that interesting as (like others have pointed out) there was no direct GPU access and there was no option to VSYNC, which makes for horrible media playback.

While both PS3 and 360 have reasonable video playback features, we all know they come nowhere near the power of XBMC and similar solutions. If you only want one device under your television and would prefer not converting/transcoding everything, this hack might well end up being very useful.

I certainly hope to add XBMC functionality to my PS3, because now that the Slim is out, it's pretty easy to move around the house and hook up to and old device (easier than moving my 360s).

So I take it you have no issues with all of the MW2 problems that are simply a result of poorly tested code? For as long as I have played online glitchers have been far worse than actual hackers because the barrier to entry is the 30 seconds it takes some ass on a message board to explain how 1337 they are.

Limited (ie crippled) homebrew was possible on the fat PS3 before this...You could run Linux, but not get access to the GPU which somewhat limits the usefulness of the system (ie no 3d games, no opengl, high definition media playing becomes harder and more cpu intensive, and interfaces have more lag).

The slim PS3 (assuming this has been hacked too) doesn't even allow this limited access.

Sony has dropped Other OS as an option on the PS3 Slim and all future PS3 releases.

Plus, as it stood the Other OS setup only let you run crippled OSes that didn't have full access to the hardware.

What I want? Something that has full control. Something that can run with full access to all the hardware, something that can then be set up to actually stream datafiles correctly and play them natively (All the UPnP crapservers have to render the file "locally", eating up resou

"I guess the main reason for this will be so you can play pirated games. Homebrew is already possible on PS3 and lets not kid ourselves, piracy is always what these things are mostly used for."

I'm fairly new to the PS3, but I can already see a use for this. I'd like Disney Singstar music for my 4 year old (Singstar is karaoke for PS3), but the only Disney Singstar available is PS2 and region locked outside of North America. Ohh.. and maybe others like me have a PS3 slim that won't allow Linux? And the

So how can I buy a fat one with a warranty on the hardware? Or should I just buy an Acer Aspire Revo PC if I want a device that works with homemade programs? Or is the fat PS3 significantly more reliable hardware-wise than Xbox 360?

Like I said, there are valid reasons for that and you have one. But lets be honest here, most people are only interested about this because it can break copy protections and will use it solely for playing pirated games.

Once the method for hacking PS3s becomes publicly available, I'm certain that 90% of the hacks will be used to play pirated games. I'm not choosing 90% for hyperbole; I mean at least 19 out of every 20. No, I haven't seen a study. This is being pulled out of a LOT of personal experience.

I'm all for the hacks, because that one user deserves to be able to use his PS3 how he wishes; but piracy is a side-effect that will numerically overwhelm the homebrew, just like it has on every cracked console (360, Wii, DS, PSP, x-box, PS2, etc.)

The difference between a computer and a ps3 is that the ps3 sells for less than it costs to make. Sony makes this money back through selling games -- claiming that there is no difference between a game console and a computer since they have equivalent parts is disingenuous. You can't have it both ways -- you either get great hardware for cheap with restrictions on it, or great hardware for a more reasonable cost and the freedom to do whatever you want with it.

This whole DLNA (DNLA?) rubbish is gross, it's so backwards.I don't want to transcode, I just want a damned good media centre (and a gaming machine!) the XBMC devs had started considering work on the PS3 a long time ago but then Sony closed the loophole to access the video card under linux (or rather accelerated mode?) so it was scrapped.

The PS3 is a fantastic chunk of hardware and while I'd really rather not get banned from their system as I have no intention (or time anymore) to pirate games, I'd love to see the machine play back stuff a bit better. (it does fairly well now but it's nothing on XBMC)The machine has 256mb of system ram, does 1080p output, optical output, 7.1 dolby hardware, wifi, hard disk, USB 2.0, gigabit networking - it's more than enough to do HD XBMC.Fingers crossed in 12 to 18 months time there's some kind of news.

I know it isn't really the same, but those looking for one, mkv2vob (PS3 Video Converter) [videohelp.com] is a really nice tool to convert 720p mkv files to format that PS3 supports. Usually you don't even need to transcode, so it takes like 1 minute per video file.

avi/xvid files work directly.

To stream them from computer, TVersity [tversity.com] is the best one.

Once you get those set up, it's actually quite nice and convenient. PS3 software and menu is actually really nice for media center, a lot better than 360's. Again not probably th

This already exists. XBMC has been ported to Windows, MacOS and Linux. A small nettop like the Asrock ION 330 is smaller and quieter than either the XBox 360 or the PS3 and is more than capable of playing back high def content.

I bet the Asrock is AWESOME! However I don't see an Asrock in my loungeroom.I see a PS2, PS3, XB1 and XB360 - the XB1 was one of the best electronics purchases I've made in my lifetime, incredible little machine.I'd love to see the PS3 get the same kind of longetivity.

I too was saddened when I found out that the supposedly Linux-friendly PS3 was going to be hypervisored up to the wazoo - I've been a Sony boycotter for years but I was seriously considering forgiving them if I got a reasonably flexible machine that would run my beloved Myth.

Alas, it didn't and when XBMC ported itself to everything and became seven kinds of awesome the disparity between the various "multimedia frontend" attempts on current-gen consoles and your plain ja

You bought a computer in form of a game console, but then noticed that the designer employed some tricks to keep you from doing certain things whit it, despite you having payed and owning the device.

Um... no. If you didn't "notice" that up front, then you were either exceptionally dim (my condolences) or were paying a dangerously low amount of attention (in which case, I fear for you crossing the street). Console makers don't exactly hide the restrictions they place on what they permit to run.

Then you would copy some data / ideas (in this case, games), which are NOT physical goods, from someone. Which is a normal thing that is a basis of human civilization.

Oh, yeah, one more thing. Let's quote someone who made this point far more articulately, Thomas Jefferson:
If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

Of course, he went on to say: Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility...

No copyright/patents/trademarks at all is a pretty bad state. Draconian DRM and unending copyright isn't productive, either. Fortunately, we can try to find a balance between them. Pretending the choice is only one or the other is ridiculous.

Linux on PS3 for non-scientific work has been a disappointing experience. There is very little code out there that uses the SPUs (and the PPU stinks for general purpose computing) and the hypervisor prevents hardware accelerated graphics.

While the first issue has to do with the community, the second is a restriction imposed by Sony. Perhaps this hack will make it possible to use the RSX (PS3's hardware graphics) in Linux? Maybe then an SNES emulator will run better on a PS3 than a second-gen iMac.

What is the Linux community's willingness to embrace a hack such as this?

I agree that the likes of redhat probably won't support this any time soon. But Debian? Gentoo? Or a community like xbox-linux could spring up.Some of the linux community are probably quite excited by this.

Before anyone goes "oh, this is only so people can play copies and cheat".

Read the other comments. See what people would like out of their PS3. They want to do "real" homebrew software, with full hardware access instead of the castrated version Sony "allows". They want to use their PS3 as a Media Center, something that's simply impossible with the current setup.

Give the people what they want and they will not crack your hardware open. Sure, some will do it for the "going to the moon" reason (it's there, and we can), but most will want their box to do what they want to do. If the box does it, no hacking will happen.

I modded my old XBox. Why? Because I wanted to run XBMC. It wanted a way to stream my movies on my HD to my TV easily. The XBox was there, a TV card for my computer wasn't (the SVideo output was really crappy), so it was a no brainer that I'd want my XBox which had logically a good TV compatible output to do the trick. It didn't do it out of the box, so it was modded. Oddly, I never bought a single game ever since, wonder why that could be...

Bottom line, when people "hack" a platform, they will of course strip all copy restriction as well, simply because it limits the ability of the box and it's possible. If you want to keep your users from hacking their box, give the box any ability your users might want to get out of it.

If I could use the full capabilities of the PS3 in Linux, I'd have bought one long since. If I could have XBMC with Blu-Ray support running on the PS3's OS, likewise. I do have an Xbox 360 even though you can't do these things, but I bought it used. I'd likely buy a new PS3; I'd certainly want a slim one.

Sony doesn't really care about all of that. They only care if you buy PS3 games as everything else will lose them money. If you buy a PS3 and use it as a computer or HTPC or whatever, they lose money on it. Only by selling games for it do they actually make money.

I bought a used Xbox to use it for a media center, and would up buying half a dozen new games and about that many used ones. The new games are sales Microsoft would not have made if not for the existence of XBMC. In addition, the consoles are now sold at a profit, however slight, and add to sales figures which corporations and fanboys alike love to announce.

So, while this part of your comment is accurate, the rest is nonsense. Getting the console into my house is a way to sneak games in there, too.

If you buy a PS3 and use it as a computer or HTPC or whatever, they lose money on it.

So why did Sony enable the installation of Linux or other OSes on the non-slim version? Even without the GPU, it has turned out an incredibly powerful computer for some uses. Some research groups use a cluster of PS3s for scientific work, for example.

Perhaps that means they need to get a reasonable business model? I mean if that's they're business model then they really need to just accept that a lot of the units are going to cost them money, rather than play the anti-trust game and see how much they can damage their merchandise before being sued.

They do accept that the units will cost them money because they know they'll make up that money in game sales. We pay a lower cost for the actual machine because they expect us to buy games. If everyone bought the machines but no one bought games they'd have to raise the price of the console, probably to the point where it'd be no more attractive to you then a regular computer. It's not like they advertise it as an open platform and I don't think anyone who has ever been to an arcade or owned another con

I'm sure some people would like to run homebrew on a PS3 just like they want to run homebrew on a DS or PSP. But these people are a tiny fraction compared to what the modded firmware would mostly be used for - piracy.

I think if Sony were smart (and it doesn't happen often), they'll bring back Linux on the PS3 and open up the GPU a bit more. Linux is perfectly adequate for homebrew applications while still preventing users from running pirated games. If they can tell homebrewers apart from pirates they hav

They want to use their PS3 as a Media Center, something that's simply impossible with the current setup.

I'd argue that the PS3's broad format support and network share support makes it into a pretty good media box, probably intentionally to remove the incentive you describe for people to hack their machines.

It will be very cool to have full system access to the resources of the PS3. Also, I know that the Cell itself has security baked into it. Does this imply that the cell itself has been compromised? I know that the two events are unrelated, but shame on you Sony for removing the Other OS option from the Slim. Why take away the coolest part of the system?

Not sure where you live but where I am, the old PS3 goes for more money then the new slim one, simply because it also allows you to play PS2 games (slim does not).
Sure you can find the odd cheap one off Ebay etc, but its still a big hassle, that is if you get one at all.

I have mixed feelings about the hack, only time will tell if its good or bad.
If it really works without any modchip then it does bring the thoughts to the SEGA Dreamcast, awesome machine but seriously flawed copyprotection.

erm, I have seen this comment, time and time again, the hyper visor only really limits GPU access. the Cell has the same full access that under Linux that games have. (one SPU reverved for the System, remaining 6 SPUs and core available for Linux)

a) The other OS function was ONLY cut from the Slim version. Fat versions still have it, and its still available on firmware updates for the fat version. Nevertheless, how you say it limits CPU does not make sense, as you do get the same CPU cores, that native PS3 games get IF you run other OS (1 general dual threaded PPU, and 6 SPUs, with 1 being reserved for the system, same as for native ps3 games). If you have a slim PS3, you cannot get other OS anyway

You also lose 256MB (of 512) of the system's RAM to the hyperviser. That SPE matters. And the graphics card might matter too, depending on what you are doing. This hack is a godsend for some of us, who have been pissed about the ridiculous, unnecessary hyperviser for a long time now.

Perhaps you've been living under a rock, but the USA has this whacky law called the DMCA which pretty much makes anyone a criminal that circumvents any sort of encryption. Some other countries that have their faces firmly planted in the USA's rectum also have similar laws. So, depending on where you are in the globe, the answer would be yes/no/maybe.

The new ACTA farce that's currently in the process of being cooked up may very well introduce even more draconion restrictions to this sort of activity.

I remember when you could purchase products for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (Super Famicom) and later on, the Nintendo 64, that allowed you to look at and modify memory. It was sold legally at stores and online

The PS3 is by far and away the most open of any mainstream console. Sony likes to ram its proprietary standards down people's throats but the PS3 is a pretty open device as far as these sort of things go.